Port Adelaide chairman David Koch believes the South Australian government's stance on keeping strong quarantine restrictions will put his club at "severe disadvantage".
However, he quips that when victory comes it will be "even sweeter" because of the challenges his team has to face to even play.
Adelaide and Port Adelaide will most likely relocated alongside their WA base counterparts to the eastern seaboard after the SA government veto the AFL desire for to the 14 day quarantine exemption to allow teams to fly in fly out of the state to play matches. The decisions has dashed the hopes of the AFL to restart the season on June 11.
Speaking on Channel Seven's Sunrise, Koch revealed the decision had taken him by surprise but he respected it.
"Obviously we're disappointed with the decision, but we've always said we'd take the advice of medical experts and also the state government," Koch told Sunrise.
"They've said they won't relax the quarantine rules. We put a proposal to them [government], which basically almost quarantined our players but allowed them to fly in and out, but [it was] not accepted and [we] absolutely accept the Chief Medical Officer's decision... because that's a community decision, we're a part of the community. We represent South Australia.
"It will put us at a severe disadvantage to the big Victorian clubs and other interstate clubs, along with the Western Australian clubs, but that will make victory sweeter, to get over those hurdles, because we still represent South Australia in the AFL. What's the option?"
Koch said the Power's preference would be to relocated to a Queensland-based hub, similar to the West Coast Eagles.
"Our preference is [to base ourselves in] Queensland but, obviously, we'll base anywhere we can to be part of the competition. The alternative is not to play and that's not an alternative," Koch said.
Crows football director Mark Ricciuto says the club is ready to play in hubs outside of South Australia after they were "blindsided" by the ruling.
Speaking on Triple M's Hot Breakfast on Thursday morning, he revealed his club will be working towards a hub solution after the letter was leaked on Wednesday night.
"All footy club presidents and CEOs and footy managers have been changing what they're doing daily. It's been just a moving beast at the moment and that's going to continue for Adelaide after that announcement," Ricciuto told Triple M's Hot Breakfast.
"Who knowns? I wouldn't be surprised if the changes here again in the next couple of days. But as of this morning, I think the Adelaide Football Club will be preparing to play in hubs outside of Adelaide for pre-the games starting and, maybe, up to the first five weeks of the footy season so they can get some certainty in the programming for the AFL."
As training restrictions vary across all states and SA's restrictions of non-contact training in groups of 10 until at least June 8 means Adelaide and Port Adelaide will most likely have to relocate to allow all clubs to progress quickly to full training in time for the June 11 restart.
It is believed that NSW and Queensland teams will receive allowances in line with those granted to their NRL counterparts, while Victorian clubs have a state government exemption.
